public holiday snapshots

today was the holiday we get for having anzac day on a sunday

billthedog was deflea'd and washed
i sleeved away (4 down, 1 to go)
will played 'smoke on the water' and 'heartbreaker' on the didge and then carefully padlocked it against didge thievesi started an idea for a new project
and i took some photos only to find that my camera had been set to over-expose (to compensate for underlit restaurants) - as you can see i was perturbed

pause for thought

this afternoon i went to see "fabrications" - the embroiders' guild's current exhibition of felting, art quilting and embroidery. i was especially taken by the work of kerry mosley an english textile artist who machine embroiders over large pieces of knitted and beaded wire. there were a number of large scale portraits and a couple of pieces with machine embroidered butterflies - all delicate and fascinating. i don't how how she makes such large scale pieces without any distortion - the knitting i have done with wire usually distorts when you looks at it sideways. not surprisingly no photos were allowed at the exhibition but go and have a look at her website.

last weekend i pinned what may be the next quilt - layered linen, fine wool suiting, kimono lining, eucalypt-dyed silk and silk satin. at the moment it's marinating on the design wall aka the kitchen door but i'm thinking of lines of running stitch.....

i also started knitting a free-form component for a wool-based quilt using my handspun yarn in colours ranging from turquoise to ochre. this one may veer off to be a burnt quilt and i might try some hand-stitching with copper wire. photos to come

(ghastly task update: i have pinned all the sleeves for the southern lands quilts and have sewn one (bear with me - i need encouragement for this task) and have started to work towards the next bit of work. as an extra carrot-stick i have decided that i can't go to the quilt convention next weekend unless i have completed the sleeving and labelling)

living high on the hog or madonna of the paella...

i'm busy making sleeves and labels for the southern lands quilts (which is why i'm blogging...) and thought i might share some of the fine dining experiences that have been had chez seahorse lately.

as you know the scrumpster and i have a food blog over here and we regularly sally forth and give serious consideration to the food on offer in high street northcote and environs with the occasional foray into cheese club.

over the last few weeks we have been to supermaxi, the estelle, denn (yet to be posted), and down under curry; had cheese club and lunched high up the food chain on the proceeds of a trip to the victoria market.
all of which is a serious distraction from sleeving and labelling...

southern lands batch #2

well i think i have done it - finished the second half of my southern lands quilts. i might have time to make another couple of smaller pieces but for now this fills the quota of 8 pieces. four are already in europe having been a taster exhibition in cologne. the full show will open in narbonne next month. the details and prices will be on the southern lands website here

three of the pieces you have seen before but this one was finished yesterday - the biggest piece so far and certainly my biggest burnt quilt (haven't measured it yet but it's bigger than the kitchen table so over 5 feet by 4 feet). i had to burn it in sessions so the fumes weren't too bad even though i was wearing a respirator and it was in a well ventilated space.

desert landscape triptych

desert pond

emergence #1

emergence #2

noodling around

noodling pretty much describes my actitvy level for the last week or so. mooching about, puddling around, doing the odd bit of knitting or stitiching as the spirit moves me wiht no particlaur muse-led frenzy.

i had planned to make the big leap forward over easter and finish the southern lands pieces but noodling won out and any leaping has been deferred until next week when the kids are back at school and i can use my day off to focus.

i did finish the ice dyed small piece with some hand stitched spirals and that is going to go off to europe. here are a couple of detail shots....

i was frustrated and irritated on good friday when for the third year in a row i tried 4 churches before i could find one that was open. i just wanted to sit in the quiet and think a bit on what is supposed to be the big festival of the church year and i was locked out... aside from alienation from the church, we spent good friday in peaceful sloth, rousing ourselves only to go to bamboo house for dinner (see review on the eat our way up high street blog here) and then to see frank woodley a part of the comedy festival.

saturday was more pottering, sunday we spent with my lovely in-laws for a bbq lunch and monday i had a quilty visit from kathryn, a fellow art quilts around the world consoeur (i just made that up - it's the sisterly version of confrere) she brought a splendid fruit salad with her including this fabbo pomegranate
a mangosteen. was my first mangosteen and was a curious and pleasing combination of creamy texture and sharp tang.

this photo of young w blowing bubbles on the back step sums up my easter break

flora challenge quilt

this is one of those pieces that might be never be finished - you could always add another line of stitching, another circle, a few more french knots... but for now it is finished enough to post as my 'flora' challenge quilt for art quilts around the world

as i said in a previous post this piece was inspired by a photo of a pond in alice springs. the blues, greens and purples were such a contrast to the ochres, oranges and deep reds of the landscape and the lushness with the surrounding desert.

this piece started out as a piece of silk painted on bubblewrap - the fabric paint pooled around the bubbles leaving lines of circles - these i outlined with free motion machine stitching and filled in some of the spaces between with undulating lines. there are hours of hand stitching in this piece - running stitch, french and bullion knots, circles, spirals, chain stitch, detached chain, fly stitch as the spirit moved me.

i used silk, cotton and linen threads, fine copper wire and metallic thread in silver and bronze.the painted silk was layered over black felted wool (another jumper sacrificed to the cause) and black linen.